Master of Agribusiness / Department of Agricultural Economics / Kevin Gwinner / The agriculture industry has been a dynamic industry exploding with change in recent years. The world has experienced extreme population growth, along with shifts in social status, dietary habits, and consumption patterns that have led to a rapidly growing and changing agriculture industry demanding increasing grain production. The expected pace of production necessary to continue to feed the world has heightened the competition in the agriculture industry. This study focuses on analyzing how Company XYZ, a strong competitor in the grain and ethanol industry, can leverage the opportunities that the growth of the agriculture industry has provided. In order to maximize opportunities with each customer and remain competitive in new territories, the need is presented to develop a repeatable process. This process will focus on determining how to interpret customer preferences to quickly make the company the first preference of choice for target customers as they grow further into North America and beyond. This thesis will focus on understanding and operationalizing two components. First, identifying the most desirable customers and what makes them desirable. Secondly, understanding, anticipating, and consistently addressing the needs of customers to address them better than the competition. To analyze and understand customer habits and behaviors this thesis examines the results of a survey conducted with existing customers. Regression analysis of the overall profitability of a customer to the company and a regression analysis of the customer's ratings of Company XYZ in relation to the competition were used to help identify how the discrimination and segmentation factors impact each regression. A cluster analysis is also implemented with the survey data to segment customers in order to develop a structured plan that can be implemented within the business practices. The cluster analysis revealed three dominant clusters that customers can be segmented into. These clusters, in conjunction with the findings from the regression analyses, help identify areas of strength and weakness to develop a plan of action for Company XYZ to implement. The plan, known as the Partner of Choice, directs the focus on implementing market segmentation to leverage customized marketing opportunities, behavioral management alignment, employee incentive opportunities, and a structured training program.

No / Passenger rail overcrowding is fast becoming a problem in major cities worldwide. This problem therefore calls for efficient, cheap and prompt solutions and policies, which would in turn require accurate modelling tools to effectively forecast the impact of transit demand management policies. To do this, we developed an agent-based model of a particular passenger rail system using an activity based simulation approach to predict the impact of public transport demand management pricing strategies. Our agent population was created using a customer/passenger mobility survey dataset. We modelled the temporal flexibility of passengers, based on patterns observed in the departure and arrival behavior of real travelers. Our model was validated using real life passenger count data from the passenger rail transit company, after which we evaluated the use of peak demand management instruments such as ticketing fares strategies, to influence peak demand of a passenger rail transport system. Our results suggest that agent-based simulation is effective in predicting passenger behavior for a transportation system, and can be used in predicting the impact of demand management policies.

This master‘s thesis is a journey of generating a prototype evaluation tool for Sparbanken Rekarne, the aim was to contribute to the emerging field as an innovation and design and specifically pre-project management. The major stakeholder was Sparbanken Rekarne AB, they needed an innovation model and the research question formulated was: What are the perspectives and the process of an early stage tool for evaluating innovation project ideas? ‘The approach was gathering theoretical knowledge in the development of the evaluation tool using a systematic literature review. The theoretical knowledge building was done by carrying out a systematic literature review to inspect different credible evaluation tool to use. Focusing specifically on pre-project evaluation tools, a knowledge gap (Gap spotting) was soon discovered after reviewing some pre-project evaluation tools. Firstly needed to see what pre-project evaluation tools are available. One stood out with stages and that ended being the main inspiration for the early-stage evaluation tool. Still basing the tool on theoretical knowledge, the solution was to hybridizing existing pre-project evaluation tools and tools already developed. Merging interactive research with Agile principals was how the information was gathered and how the project was planned. The data gathered was dissected and used in developing the evaluation tool. Purpose of the pre-project evaluation tool is to bring clarity for Sparbanken Rekarne in making decisions about choosing pre-projects to invest in. This master‘s thesis gives a detailed description of how to implement the Early-stage evaluation tool (Chapter 4) from a Sparbanken Rekarne developer‘s perspective. Results, a contribution to innovation and design, specifically pre-project management. The early-stage evaluation tool can maturate idea‘s into concept pre-project that are measured. Involvement with all stakeholder makes sure the pre-projects entering the project planning phase has a market.

De flesta professionella idrottare har förstått hur viktigt sociala medier har blivit för att bygga en stark image för sitt personliga varumärke. Få vet dock hur de ska gå till väga för att lyckas med detta. Denna studies syfte är att försöka beskriva hur idrottare kan gå till väga för att lyckas genom att beskriva genom vilka sociala mediekanaler fans föredrar att följa idrottare på samt vilken typ av innehåll de föredrar att idrottaren publicerar. För att försöka beskriva detta har en kundundersökning i form utav en enkät genomförts. Resultatet av enkätundersökningen visade att kvinnliga fans helst följer professionella idrottare via bildbaserade sociala medier medan männen i större utsträckning föredrar textbaserade eller kombination av bild och text. Det mest uppskattade innehållet bland fansen var motiverande och/eller inspirerande budskap tätt följt av innehåll kopplat direkt eller indirekt till idrottarens yrkesroll som professionell idrottare. Ämnet visade sig dock vara mer komplext än vad utgångspunkten till denna studie baserat på den lilla mängd tidigare forskning pekade på vid formulerandet av frågeställningen. Då resultatet analyserades med den teoretiska referensramen som bakgrund tyder det på att fler parter har stora intressen i den professionella idrottarens sociala mediakommunikation än vad utgångspunkten för denna studie var. Slutsatser från denna studie är att det är viktigt att idrottaren sätter sina fans/följare i centrum för att lyckas bygga en stark personlig image på sociala medier. Att idrottaren också interagerar med och har en personlig kommunikation med fansen tycks även det vara en viktig i varumärkesbyggandet. Samt att vidare studier inom ämnet skulle behövas för att kunna dra slutsatser om hur de olika parternas intressen påverkar varandra och hur intressekonflikter kan undvikas. / Most professional athletes have understood how important social media have become to build a strong brand image for their personal brand. However, few athletes know how to succeed in doing this. The purpose of this study is to try to describe how athletes can build and improve their personal brand image on social media by examining on which social media platforms fans prefer to follow athletes and what kind of content they prefer the athlete to publish. To study this, a customer survey has been conducted. The results of the survey showed that female fans prefer to follow professional athletes through image-based social media while men to a greater extent prefer text-based or a combination of image and text. The most appreciated content among the fans was motivating and / or inspiring content closely followed by content linked directly or indirectly to the athlete's professional role as an athlete. However, the subject proved to be more complex than the what was assumed at the starting point of this study. When this studys result was analyzed with the theoretical reference frame as background, it appears that more parties have major interests in the professional athletes social media communication than what was assumed. Conclusions from this study are that it is important that the athlete puts hers / his fans and followers at the center of hers / his social media strategies to successfully be able to build a strong personal brand image on social media. It also seems to be important that the athlete interacts with and has a personal communication with the fans to build their personal brand. Further studies on the subject would be needed to draw conclusions about how the parties different interests affect each other and how conflicts of interests can be avoided.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to identify perceived shortcomings in the process of building permits in municipality of Enköping from former customers’ perspective. The study also looked at if the content of the legislation made it difficult for the municipality to improve the process. Based on the identified shortcomings of the process a number of concrete improvement suggestions are presented that the municipality can use in future work to reach more satisfied customers and a more efficient process. Methods: To identify the perceived shortcomings a digital survey was sent to former customers in which they were asked about their experience and what could have made it better. Furthermore, an interview was made with the head of the building permits department to get an additional perspective on how the process works and what shortcomings are already known. The interview also helped to get the opinion of the municipality about the content of the legislation and if it makes their work easier or harder. Results: The results of the survey showed that five main areas were experienced as negative or difficult; the time-limit, the application documentation, the interpretation of the legislation, the fees and the ways to contact the department. The suggested improvements regarded an update of the information on the website, an increased efficiency in the channels of communication and a larger accessibility, structured work on consensus in interpretations of legislation and an increase of the digital services. Conclusions: The way to a more effective building permit process is not simple and many different factors can affect a costumer’s experience. By providing easy accessible and easy understandable information as well as digital services for the customers the time-limit of the process decreases. By creating a common interpretation of legislation between co-workers within the department and good ways for the costumer to communicate with the municipality many misunderstandings and a lot of frustration and potential delays can be avoided.